08:54 BST

  This morning was a very cold start - just 8° C - but the full sunshine, that should last until 11am, and then followed by sunny spells, should see an afternoon high of 16° C. The wind may not be too strong, and there would seem to be zero chance of rain today. It may not feel too bad in the sunshine, but probably a little cool in the shade. After a clear night, tomorrow could start at just 7° C, but some hours of full sunshine should warm things up fairly fast. It is possible that from 1pm the clouds will gather, and tomorrow after should still be dry, but it may get very dull and gloomy. That will make the high of 16° C feel a lot cooler than today's 16° C with sunny spells.

    Yesterday could be described as a good day for several reasons. The full sunshine instead of the forecast sunny spells yesterday morning was one good thing. Washing my hair and having a long overdue morning shower was a good thing too. The best thing was going out ! The less good thing was I heard from Jodie, and she said she was giving the beer session in the afternoon a miss because she didn't fancy rail replacement buses.

  The biggest reason for going out was to get some fresh bottles of Diet Coke. My original plan was to go to Aldi, but for some reason I didn't really want to go there. I can't remember why, but I think I thought I wasn't feeling fit enough for the walk to Aldi. I didn't really need any food, an so I thought I would go to Poundstretcher and get my Diet Coke from there (even though they only have it in 1.25 litre bottles).

  The walk to Poundstretcher is only a minute or two less than the walk to Aldi. I used that shorter distance to wear a pair of Adidas "Court" shoes that need some wearing in. This time they did seem mostly comfortable in some respects, but they are too stiff. That makes walking in them a bit like hard work, and slows me down a bit. However, I did slightly extend my walk by 100ft, or maybe less.

  Curiosity meant I walked by Tesco so I could see how many staffed tills there were, and how busy they looked. I was rather pleased to see 3 staffed checkouts, and they did not look very busy. I made a split second decision to do my shopping in Tesco for the first time in 3 or 4 weeks. My biggest fear was that by the time I got to the checkouts things could have changed, and I would end up dumping my shopping basket and leave the store empty handed. That did not happen.

  I first made a beeline to the aisle that has, in several places rather than all together, the instant noodles. They don't have as big a selection as the little supermarket on Catford Bridge, but much of what they have is different. That included some Japanese (or Korean) instant noodles that I had never seen before. I would have one for breakfast this morning, and I shall comment about it towards the end of this page.

  I quite quickly filled my shopping basket up with stuff, including 3 or 4 items from the reduced price shelf. I should have been looking for stuff that would be healthier for me to eat, but in the excitement I sort of ignored that idea. In some ways that would turn out good, but more about that later as well. I ended up with just room to balance three 2 litre bottles of Diet Coke on the basket, and I carried a fourth.

  When I got to the checkouts I found they were still 2 open. One seemed to have a few people waiting, but the other only had one person waiting behind someone actually being served. There was even some room on the conveyor belt for me to start loading my stuff on it. I was quite pleased about that. It was just like old times...or something. I was also quite pleased with how little I had spent compared to shopping in Aldi, but then again I use two shopping bags for Aldi, and only a single bag for Tesco (with the heavy Diet Coke bottles in my rucksack at both stores).

  It was not a dull plod home with my shopping, but neither was it a fast sprint ! I admit it was a bit close to a dull plod ! I felt quite warm by the time I got home, and would feel warmer still not very long later. After putting my shopping away I had some lunch. It was a strange mix of stuff. I started with a very small cheese and roast shallot quiche (about 3 inches wide). I ate that with some cheese coleslaw. The coleslaw made the quiche completely tasteless.

  (Almost forgot: When I reached home I saw the lady next door come out of her front door, and she waved to me so I stopped for a brief chat. As she came out of her front door she was followed by Fluffy Cat. My theory about him spending some time inside next door was right ! The lady had managed to read the tag on his collar. It did not have his name on, but the name of the maker of the collar. Another mystery solved. Whatever happened to the collar is another mystery.

  Part two of my lunch was a tub, and not a small tube (but a lot less than huge) of pasta in tomato sauce. The pasta itself is not too bad for me, but the tomato sauce adds a large amount of sugar to it. I added some hot pepper sauce for extra flavour. The quiche seemed negligible, but stuffing myself with all the coleslaw, and then the pasta in the thick tomato sauce, left me feeling a bit stuffed.

  I was also getting hints of heartburn - probably from the hot pepper sauce, but it could have been the coleslaw. Eating more when I was feeling a bit stuff may not sound like a good idea, but I did eat more, and it was chocolate ice cream. That, more than anything else, seemed to tamp down the gathering heartburn. That ice cream was one that definitely mentioned Sodium Alginate in the ingredients, and that should have, and indeed does seem to have stopped a lot of the sugar being absorbed in the gut.

  Despite the ice cream I was feeling quite hot after I had finished eating. The morning sunshine had got my bedroom quite warm, and the hot pepper sauce did the rest. I felt hot and sweaty, and I also felt like a nice lie down, and a snooze. I decided I could not snooze for too long because I had another big bucket of laundry to do. I had started it off straight after my shower, and this time I did not want to leave it blocking the use of the bath today, although I can't remember why.

  I don't know how long I snoozed for, but it was probably getting on for 3pm, and maybe later when I got back to the laundry. I wrung out the detergent, and I did one rinse before I took a break to get back to the book I had started reading before, and a bit after the snooze. It was the book of short stories by Harlan Ellison I previously mentioned.

  Every thing I have read about Harlan Ellison praises him as being a great writer. I am not so sure. I have only read one short story from the new book, but I came away dissatisfied. The idea behind the story is good, but I don't seem to like his writing style. All I can say is that I don't think it flows nicely. It is the sort of writing that English teachers like because it pisses off the school children, like Shakespeare. At the same time those teachers don't like Isaac Asimov because his writing is too simple, and yet it is so easy to read. The words just seem to glide by, and it is so well written that there is no ambiguity about what is being said. Maybe it is just my simple tastes.

  After another hour or two I got bored reading and I was all snoozed out.  I decided to see if there was anything on TV. I wasn't expecting much being as it was a Sunday, but I did find Channel E4 showing some fairly recent episodes of The Simpsons, and I watched some episodes I couldn't recall seeing before. When one did come on I waited until the first commercial break, and got back to my laundry. I carried on until I had finished the washing, and had it hanging up to dry.

  From then on TV got quite disappointing. There was no 6 O'clock news - it had been replaced by woman's rugby, or something like that. I had no interest in watching that. Sky Arts had a recording of a concert by a band whose name escapes me. The band are good on record, but the concert seemed quite boring. It was followed by a Queen concert, and that had zero interest from me. I did some channel surfing, and gave up on TV for the night. There was an edition of QI, but that looked like it would be terrible (It was hosted by Sandi with some very weird friends on the panel).

  I think I went back to the E4 channel for more Simpsons while I ate my dinner - except I didn't have a dinner ! I thought my lunch had been too big, and decided that all I should have for dinner was a small handful of chilli flavour peanuts and a very large Penderyn Welsh whisky (matured in Madeira casks).  Apart from the booze, this is the sort of thing that should be easy when on the Mounjaro "slimming jabs" (which I hope to start this coming Wednesday). Oddly enough, it seemed completely painless to do it last night - and gave some good results.

  I was back on my bed at about 8.30pm. The whisky worked well as a sedative because I seemed to be quite ready for sleep. I had been about to start reading another story, but put my book down on the bed beside me, closed my eyes, and it seemed like I must have fallen asleep in seconds. It feels good to be able to do that. If only I could have fallen asleep so fast (or indeed just fallen asleep any time) back in those halcyon days of 2016 when I occasionally shared Angela's bed.

  I must have slept well last night because I woke up around 3am feeling cold, and needing a pee, and I saw the book still laying on the bed exactly where I had left it. If I had been thrashing around it would presumably have been on the floor. I think it was at 3am when I didn't feel that I needed a pee urgently, but when I got to the toilet it seemed I peed a huge amount. I had another large pee when I woke at 5am. It did not bode well for my blood glucose readings.

  Once again, 5am seemed too early to get up despite getting to sleep quite early last night. It was probably because it was still dark outside. Sunrise was at 6.45am this morning according to the BBC weather page. I turned up the thermostat on the heater a bit, and although it didn't seem like I would fall asleep again, the extra warmth did the trick, and I didn't get up until almost 8am,

  When I got up I had another quite large pee, and surprisingly large poo. When I weighed myself I found I weight 400gm lighter, and that was 300gm more than needed to go to the next colour code in my multicoloured spreadsheet of daily weight measurements (first thing in the morning only). Sometimes I wonder if I really need the Mounjaro jabs, but it is the easiest option, and it does get far more difficult losing weight in the cold, grey and wet miserable months.

  My weight was good, and I was shocked to see my blood glucose was good too. I had a fair idea I had mostly avoided any sugar after the pasta with tomato sauce, but some of those big pees I had, plus a dry mouth sometimes, suggested otherwise. The Contour meter read 7.5mmol/l, and that is spot on my current, self imposed, target. The GlucoRX meter read even better at 7.2mmol/l. The new GlucoFix meter read 7.5mmol/l - exactly the same as the Contour meter.

  Even my blood pressure seems good this morning. I only needed to take one reading because 111/44 was quite low enough, although possibly a tiny weeny bit lower than one of my doctors would like. It is almost like I am sort of healthy today. It is a shame I don't really feel all that good. I suppose I don't actually feel bad. It is just that I don't feel bouncingly good.

  I did have, and maybe almost still have, an idea that I could or should go out for a walk today. The weather is a bit cool, but it should be good enough for walking in just a t-shirt and shorts. I am thinking I could do a half walk today. A walk all the way to New Beckenham station, and then get the train back to Catford. I could see all the places I haven't seen for a long time, and not have to see them twice on the way home again. The catch is that while it would seem to be a good idea, I don't seem to find any enthusiasm for it.

  The real trouble is that with angina pains, shortness of breath, and leg pains because my legs have not been used enough to tone the muscles, it makes it almost impossible to enjoy a walk for the same of a walk. It would be a different matter if I had a reason to get where I was going, but there is no reason apart from it might be good for me. I really hope that when I see the hospital cardiology team on the 15th October they can arrange to get my heart valve fixed, and hopefully walking will become a pleasure again.